One advantage offered by “human-powered” vehicles is that such vehicles provide exercise for the rider, improving health and fitness. Other activities, such as running and jogging, also provide exercise, but are difficult on the back, legs, feet, and joints. Cycling avoids the jarring effect of running or jogging, but requires high speeds or long distances to achieve truly beneficial aerobic exercise. None of these activities provide meaningful upper body exercise. What is needed is a vehicle which provides aerobic benefit even at low speeds, and which provides the rider with an upper body workout. This may be accomplished by using simultaneous arm and leg movements to propel the vehicle.
Although some vehicles are known to utilize both the arms and legs to produce propulsion, these vehicles tend to utilize the power of the human body in an inefficient manner. Power typically is applied only in surges, and when such power is applied, the muscles are active in only one direction. One example of such a vehicle is U.S. Pat. No. 5,280,936 to Schmidlin. This vehicle has a complex and expensive arrangement of chains, rollers, and sprockets.
One problem which is common to human-powered vehicles which employ both the arms and legs to propel the vehicle relates to steering, an operation which may be complicated by the use of the rider's arms for propulsion. Presently known art attempts to address this problem, but has not completely solved the problem. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,775,708 to Heath discloses an “Exercise Vehicle with Cable Steering System.” This vehicle discloses arm levers that moved back-and-forth to aid propulsion and a push/pull cable steering system with actuating hand cranks on the arm levers. However, this cable steering system requires expensive cables which would eventually need to be replaced. Additionally, the steering cable would bend, developing friction that would require additional force to overcome. Also, when bent, there is slack in the cables, requiring extra movement in one end of the steering system before the other end moves.
The following represents a list of known related art:
Date of Issue/Reference:Issued to:Publication:U.S. Pat. No. 4,674,762Nelson et al.Jun. 23, 1987U.S. Pat. No. 5,280,936Schmidlin.Jan. 25, 1994U.S. Pat. No. 5,775,708HeathJul. 7, 1998
The teachings of each of the above-listed citations (which does not itself incorporate essential material by reference) are herein incorporated by reference. None of the above inventions and patents, taken either singularly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed.